Carice van Houten

The long summer is ending, winter is coming, and don't even think about spring. The second season of HBO's thrilling fantasy drama Game of Thrones has arrived.

Episode one, "The North Remembers," was a typically seat-of-your-pants, edge-of-your-seat tour of the geography of Westeros, from deserts to ice-bound forests, as we witnessed rival camps preparing to go to war for the Iron Throne.

Here are the developments (spoiler alert) that most intrigued me and will have me hooked for the whole season: